


needed something to cling to [so she did]

by Signel_chan



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, Humanstuck, One Night Stands, Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-04
Updated: 2014-05-04
Packaged: 2018-01-21 21:12:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,833
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1564223
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Signel_chan/pseuds/Signel_chan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Due to Dave convincing her that she's desperate for a man after the one she has leaves her, Jade ends up sleeping with three guys over the course of a week--just to realize that she wasn't as alone as she thought she was. And, of course, sleeping around has its own consequences that she now has to deal with.<br/>What's a girl supposed to do in that situation?</p>
            </blockquote>





	needed something to cling to [so she did]

Jade had been with her boyfriend for a long time, what seemed like forever, but she couldn’t help but wonder what other guys were out there for her. She loved Karkat, she really did, but he was a grouch who hadn’t grown out of his perpetual grumpy stage in the three years since high school graduation, and there was only so much of his grumbling and displeasure with everything that she could take. It just so happened that, although he loved her very much too, he couldn’t handle the constant cheer and positivity that miss Harley gave off and he needed to split.

She wasn’t exactly dependent on having a significant other around, but when Karkat packed his bags and left for greener pastures, she was lost for a few days. She hadn’t been without him since they were in middle school, and she had figured that they’d spend the rest of their days together. There was always the chance that he’d come back, but until he did, Jade needed to find some way to fill the void that he had left.

Her best friend in the world was the person she turned to. “Of course he left you, I’ve been telling you he’s got the hots for other chicks since you met him.” Dave’s voice was always calming to Jade, but when she was as distraught as she was then, it was like an angel speaking to her. “If you need a place to crash, you know my couch is open for business. We can have feelings jams and play music and get him out of your heart.”

“Thanks, Dave, means a lot to hear that. Me and Bec will be over there soon, promise!” Just knowing that at least someone still cared (the fact that that someone had been her friend since before they could talk was a big plus) put some of the pep back in Jade’s step. She cheerfully threw a week’s worth of clothes into a bag, grabbed her dog Bec’s food dish, made sure to lock up her apartment really tightly, and made her way the few city blocks to the little shack Dave called home. He greeted her with a smile and a hug, which she returned to him once she put her things down and got Bec situated. “It’s weird, being here without Karkat…”

“Yo, hey, no saying that name while within these walls. He is not a topic to discuss as long as you haven’t replaced his sorry ass.” Dave, having been through a few bad breakups in his day, knew what Jade needed to get her mind off of her lost love. “We’re going to find you a new guy, somehow. You don’t drink and you don’t party, so I’m not sure how it’s going to happen.”

“Hey, I drink and party,” she retorted, punching him playfully in the shoulder. “I’m old enough for that, so I do it. I just wasn’t into getting in trouble for doing all that underage. Besides, Karkat was so against it.”

He snorted. “Mister High-and-Mighty would get wasted with the rest of us, so I don’t get what his problem was. And you said his name again.”

“Right. Sorry.”

“The rule’s enacted for your sanity, not mine.” Dave pulled out his phone and began flipping through his contacts. “Would you mind if I tried to hook you up with some of my friends? They need a smokin’ babe for arm candy, and you could fill that role for them.”

“No thanks, Dave. I’ve seen your friends and I’m not interested.” She flopped down on his couch, and he sat next to her. “I just want him back. But I doubt I’m going to actually get him back, so maybe now’s my chance to go out and find someone on my own.” He started to mention his available friends again, but she cut him off. “On my _own_ , Dave. That means I go out and find them in the crowd and make them mine.”

He gave her an offended look, before laughing. “Whatever you say, Jade. You know you’re too good for the guys you’re going to find in this town on any given night. You’ve got to know where to look for them.”

“I know better than to look in the places you pick up chicks, thank you very much.” She was able to say that with a smile on her lips, as he gave another offended look in her direction. “What? We both know that you think coffee shops are the coolest places to find women to try to seduce, and we both know how that has worked every single time you’ve done it.”

“So maybe the socialites and nerds who go to Starbucks religiously aren’t exactly the best people to try to date. At least they were a good screw.” He shrugged, putting his phone away. “I invited a friend over for the upcoming weekend.”

She rolled her eyes. “Didn’t I say I wanted to find a guy on my own?”

“You did, and I never said that I was inviting John here for you. It’s been a while since me and him last had a good bro weekend, and since he’s freshly twenty-one, I don’t see any problems with getting smashed with him.” He shrugged, before expertly dodging another punch thrown at him, this one aimed at his face. “Hey, I just fucking said he’s not going to be here for you. What’s the problem with me having a friend over?”

“The fact that I’m here, and you’re going to let him crash here on your couch while I’m already crashing on your couch.” She tried to punch him again, but he grabbed her fist and held it inches from his cheek. “You’re such a jerk, Dave.”

“Tell me something I don’t know.” When he let go of her hand, she used it to pinch his chest, twisting his nipple under his shirt and causing him to scream. “Ow! Don’t make me take back my niceness and kick you out!”

“Take back your invitation for him to come here then!”

Dave’s phone started buzzing, and when he checked it, he chuckled. “Too late, Jade. He’ll be here Friday night.” She responded by twisting harder, making him scream some more. “You can still sleep here, you know. Or maybe you’ll go home. Or find a new guy to love. Just let go of me!”

“Like I said, you’re a jerk.” She pulled her hand away and he sighed in relief, rubbing at the area she had just irritated. “I’m probably going to just go home when he walks in here. Why would I want to even be in the same building as him? Last time I saw that ass, he threw a bucket of water on my head.”

“Last time you saw him, we were all still in school. Chill out, he’s grown up since then.” As much as she didn’t want to believe him, she knew that it had to be true, and that John would have had to have grown up since the last time she hung out with him. “Besides, he’s not going to be here until Friday, and since it’s Monday…you’ve got time to get your shit back together and be back at your love nest with some new guy. Or the old one. I don’t know.”

“The old one walked out on me for no reason, so I doubt he’ll be the one I go back there with. And I’m not the kind of girl who hooks up with guys within less than a week, Dave. You taught me not to do that.” She laughed. “Remember that time you dated that Terezi chick who swore she could taste colors? You got her to eat chalk the day you met her, and then you dated her when she did.”

His face paled, a barely-noticeable difference but a difference nonetheless. “We don’t talk about her, okay? She was a mistake.”

“Same with Rose?”

“She was only a mistake because everyone asked if we were related and it was too fucking creepy to keep going down on her when all I could think was that, y’know, maybe she fucking was my sister.” He shuddered, making Jade laugh even more. “No more talking about my exes. It’s humiliating to make me remember those choices I made.”

“And that’s why I’m going to be my own woman and not make the mistakes my best friend has made. I’m going to make smart, educated choices, and date any guy until I’ve known him _at least_ a week.” She puffed her chest out and it was then Dave’s turn to laugh. “What’s so funny? Don’t think I can do it?”

He was laughing too hard to respond, shaking and fanning himself with his phone in hand. When he could get words to come out, they were still interrupted every few seconds with more laughter. “I can guarantee you, if Friday comes and you’re still single, you will hook up with John. That’s how desperate I know you are for a new lover.”

“I’m not desperate!” Standing up to walk around the room a few times, she tried to make it very clear that she was indeed not desperate: “I can go a while without a man to share a bed with. I’ve got my dog! Bec hasn’t shared a bed with me in ages!”

“Jade, you’re so desperate you’re willing to sleep with your dog.”

She stopped mid-step, before falling backwards against the wall, sliding to a sitting position. “I didn’t just say that.”

“I heard you loud and clear, sister.”

“It’s not what I meant, Dave!” Her hands were thrown in the air, and she screamed a bit. “I don’t need a man to hold me and love me! I am a strong and independent woman, I swear!” For being as strong and independent as she insisted she was, it was really easy for Dave to convince her to go out to the bar right down the street to socialize with, as Dave referred to them, the loser bunch who wasn’t capable of knowing what love is. All he had to do was mention how lonely the guys were, and she was down for it; of course, she swore that she was doing it to maybe dip her toes in the dating pool.

One step in the bar’s door and she was already regretting her decision to go. There were four guys in the entire place, from what she could see, and two of them looked to be workers. The other two, sitting at the bar top arguing with each other in loud voices, had to be the only patrons that she could talk to. She gulped, stepped forward, and hit a creaky board on the floor that directed the attention of everyone to her. She was in, and she couldn’t get out now.

* * *

Six bottles of beer, two for each of them, were purchased and consumed over the course of the night. Jade had originally argued against getting drunk with two guys she had literally met moments before it was offered, but they were so persuasive that she couldn’t help but agree to their terms. It wasn’t just drinking that they wanted, though: they wanted someone to hear them out with their complicated love story.

“Whoa, so you’re both dating the same woman?” she asked, her eyes wide and slightly bloodshot behind her glasses. When she was even slightly tipsy, she became very interested in everything going on, as well as very easily convinced of things. “How does that work?”

“It doesn’t,” the darker-skinned of the duo replied. “It just doesn’t. She thinks she’s got it all secret and she, uh, doesn’t.”

“Yeah, how she thinks we don’t know she’s bangin’ us both, we’re not quite sure.” The other man, as pale as Dave and probably twice as big of a douchebag in appearance, took a swig of his drink. Before he had started drinking, his voice sounded relatively normal, but now he had a stumble over words that made it sound like he was a ship on rough waters. “But she thinks we don’t know, and it’s cute, since we come here an’ compare experiences.”

“That’s so cool. If I did something like that, I’d be caught so fast…”

They shared a glance between each other before asking Jade the logical question following her statement. “You have someone at home for you?” they asked in perfect unison, their voices clashing against each other’s.

“Not anymore. He walked out earlier today, and now I’m here. I don’t even go out like this, guys. I’m only here because my friend convinced me to come.” She waved her hand, giving the sense of shaking off Karkat and what he had meant to her. “But I’d be up for two guys at once, I think. Not today, but sometime.”

“Oh, I thought you were about to say you’d want us.” The stumble in his voice had gotten worse, and the guy got off of his bar stool to walk away dejectedly. “So much for me gettin’ a girl on the side that’s not Vris.”

“Are you saying you don’t want Vriska anymore?” the other man asked, widening his eyes and grinning. “Does this mean I can have her for myself?”

“Nah, fuck that. She’s a dominant bitch and I love it. I was just hopin’ for some side action.” He took a few swaying steps towards the door, before sighing and coming back to his original seat. “Guess no one else wants a piece of ol’ Eridan except Vris, but she doesn’t count because she wants some Tav too.”

“It would be nice to have someone to be with on nights she’s with you…” The guy _not_ known as Eridan sighed, putting his elbows on the bar and his chin in his hands. “But where would I find another girl who would want me?”

Jade sat between them, sipping on her drink, as they moped about not having anyone who would want them aside from the one woman who already did. Eventually, they got the idea that she wasn’t paying attention to them, and they stopped, but by then Jade was drunk enough to not really care about what sober her would do. “Maybe you can get with me, both of you!”

“Yeah? And maybe we’ll get Vris to admit she’s seein’ us both,” Eridan whined, looking at her. “It’s just not gonna happen, now is it?”

“I said maybe, so maybe it will!”

“Are you hearin’ this, Tav? She said maybe she’ll get with us!” His spirits changed almost immediately, and he had gone from sad to ecstatic in seconds. His friend, however, did not seem to have the same reaction. “Uh, Tav? Tavros? You okay there, buddy?”

He nodded, moving his arms from where they had been the entire time and turning so that he was facing them both. “I’m just thinking. What if we, uh, make a pact or something?”

“What kind of pact we talkin’? Is it beneficial to us all?”

“I wouldn’t suggest one that isn’t. How about tonight, we leave without doing anything, but me and you,” he pointed a shaking finger at Eridan, “we decide who comes back tomorrow. Then that one of us gets to be with her for a night, and then the next night we switch.” His hand, trembling from nerves at the suggestion and the effect of alcohol on his body, rested itself on Jade’s leg. “That way, we all get what we want.”

“Tav, sometimes you’re a fuckin’ loon, but right now you’re speakin’ sense and I like it.” Both men grinned and, with their eyes focused solely on Jade’s potential expression, she decided she had to grin too. After all, this was two guys making deals on being with her, and she was drunk and didn’t really care. If she found out about it in the morning, she certainly would care, but at that moment on that bar stool, all she wanted was a nice guy to cuddle with.

She hadn’t intended to say the last part out loud, however, but based on the reactions she got, she definitely had done it. “Do you want us to change the plan up? We could decide right now who gets you tonight…” There was as much of a shake to Tavros’ voice as there was to his hands, but while Eridan was almost impossible to understand when he spoke, Tavros sounded more like he had a pesky stutter. “If that’s okay with you, of course.”

“Oh yeah, that’s fine with me. As long as we do everything my way.” Her words had come out with an assertive tone attached to them, and just hearing them made Eridan shake his head and turn away. “What’s wrong? Did I say something wrong?”

“I got dominated last night, babe. If you’re gonna play queen of the bedroom, you can be with Tav tonight. I’ll get you tomorrow though, just you wait.” He got off the stool and, after making sure to pay for their drinks, stumbled to the door without another word.

That left Jade sitting there with Tavros next to her, his hand still on her leg. She shyly smiled at him and he froze, realizing that Eridan had just left. “Wait, so I get to be with you tonight?”

“Seems to be that way. What does someone do when they drunkenly hook up with someone in a bar?” She didn’t intend to sound so confused, but in the state she was in it was impossible to hide her true feelings anymore. For one of the few times in her life thus far, she was utterly lost at what to do next. “I’ve been with the same guy since middle school, and he really just walked out on me today. I don’t know anything but him.”

“And I don’t know anything but being a side guy in a relationship, so, uh…” His brown eyes were shining as they met hers, still hidden behind her glasses. “Maybe we can just go talk and get to know each other better? No one said that this meant we had to do anything bad.”

It was true, no one had said a thing about the situation veering into inappropriate territory, but for some reason, in her drunken state, Jade felt that paying her new male companion for his presence was needed. Since the tab was taken care of and so she couldn’t cover his drinks, she had to do something else. A little bit of oral sex out behind the bar, plus the real deal once they made their way back to his apartment was more than enough of a payment.

In the morning, she vaguely remembered the events of the night before, but she felt no shame for what she had done. It was something people she had gone to school with had always done, and now she was getting her taste of the risque lifestyle that Karkat had prevented her from having. She thanked Tavros for what he had done for her, exchanging numbers with him so that if she ever wanted to “free him from his terrible relationship”, she could do just that, and then she was back to Dave’s house, where he waited for her.

“You slept with a guy, didn’t you?” he asked her the second she had closed the front door behind her. “You really were desperate. Told you.”

“So maybe I got drunk and did something I’d never done. That’s okay. It’s not like I’ve got a boyfriend at home waiting for me.” She collapsed on the couch, her head pounding from the drinking she had done. “Where’s my dog, Dave? Where’d you put him?”

He shrugged. “Last time I saw him, he was on my bed. I almost killed him, by the way. Not used to having something brushing up against my legs while I’m getting my sleep.”

“You better not have hurt a hair on Bec’s head.”

“Don’t worry, he’s fine. He’s probably still snoozing on my bed, that’s all.” He gave her a once-over look, shaking his head as he did. “You look like you need to join him. You must have gotten wasted and fucked like a rabbit last night.”

“Something like that, yeah.” It was her turn to shrug. “He was a really nice guy, stuck in some weird relationship. And another guy was involved too. I get to see him tonight…I think.” She placed a finger on her chin as she tried to correctly remember what had happened before they left the bar. “I think his name was Eridan…?”

“Ah yes, never-been-laid Ampora. Real douchebag of a guy. Says he gets fucked bi-weekly by some bitch with tits roughly the size of Jupiter. I don’t believe a word he says. Have fun being someone’s first time, I guess.” Dave’s phone started to buzz and he left the room to answer it, leaving Jade sprawled out on the couch, trying to make sense of her life and what it had become in just one day of being single. By the time she was expected to go back to that bar and find her second date, she had absolutely no answers for herself as to how her life had gone to pieces so quickly, and she knew that she’d be asking herself the same thing the next day.

That night wasn’t as risque as the first, as there was no time for drinking at the bar, but there were many bottles of strange brews passed around a dingy house with purple walls and the faint odor of fish. There was also the haze of being drunk, the lack of overall judgment, and the waking up unsure of what had happened the night before. The only difference between the two nights was that when she woke up with this hangover, the sound of arguing filled her ears before the voice of the man she had gotten adventurous with did.

There was no shame for sleeping with Eridan on her part, but she was almost positive that he was ashamed of sleeping with her. His voice, when yelling back at the woman who had somehow gotten into the house, was timid even though it was filled with anger, and when he spoke of her he only mentioned a drunken tryst, not that it was planned out in advance. She had to lay in his bed until the arguing subsided, by which point she had heard the entire three-person relationship story come out into the open and no regrets about it be declared; when she finally got to leave, it was after noon and she knew she’d have a lot of explaining to Dave to do.

“You wrecked their romance?” It was the first thing Dave asked her after she had told him everything that she remembered from start to finish. “You seriously ruined what they had going for them? Well at least now you know that you can find a new guy if you need one.”

“I don’t think I’d date either one of them, to be honest. Especially since you knew one of them as ‘never-been-laid’ until literally just now.” She rolled her eyes, throwing a pillow over her face to block out all light. “I can’t believe I actually slept with two guys in two nights. Doesn’t that make me a whore?”

“Apparently their bitch was sleeping with two guys every two nights, so I don’t see any problem with what you did. Not like you have someone waiting for you back home, you know.” He sat next to her on the couch, calling Bec up to get in between them. “You better be staying here tonight, though, because if you find some other guy to hook up with…”

From beneath the pillow, she shook her head as fast as she could. “I think I’m good on my one-night-stand quota for the rest of my life.”

“Sounds good. I don’t think I could stomach another one of these stories.” Bec whined and poked at Jade’s leg a bit, smelling the scents of strange homes and alcohol on her body, and since she was under the pillow and couldn’t see him, Dave had to comfort him. “I don’t think your dog could handle it either.”

“I’m sure he’s worried sick about me. He never sleeps without me around, and it’s been two nights in a row…” She would have said more if it weren’t for a wave of pain that hit her head and caused her to moan in discomfort. “Fuck being adventurous, Dave. It’s the worst.”

“Yeah, you’re saying that now, but I’m sure when you were being screwed, you were saying it’s the best.” He shrugged, she moaned again, and the rest of the day was spent with them laying low, her trying to recover from her hangover and him trying to be the supportive best friend that he made himself out to be.

By the time Friday rolled around and one John Egbert made his appearance in the house, things were better for Jade and she was almost ready to go back to her own place and try to rebuild her life. Dave insisted that she stick around for his other best friend, and as much as she did not want to do it, she had to for him. After all, Dave had been kind enough to let her stay with him for this long, so when he demanded a few more nights, it would have been rude to turn him down. So when John knocked at the door and she was the one to greet him, not the one who invited him over, he was shocked.

“You live here now?” he asked, coming inside. “Or are you here to make me think that Dave scored himself an untouchable babe?”

“No, I’ve just been staying here since Karkat left me. I’d be leaving now if I had my way, but Dave insists that I stay here.” She shrugged as she closed the door behind him. “Maybe he thinks that something will happen between us? I don’t know.”

“What did you say? Karkat left you? He doesn’t know what he’s left behind, I guess.” John smiled his goofy grin, teeth so out of place that no amount of dental work could fix them. “Maybe Dave does think that I’ll swoop in and take what Karkat’s left behind.”

She gave a second shrug, before laughing. “I hope that’s not his plan. If it is, I’m going to kick him so hard he can’t stand for a week.” Her comment made John laugh as well, and their combined laughter brought Dave into the room, a smirk plastered on his face as he greeted his friend and asked what was so funny. “Nothing, nothing, just reminding John here about that bucket prank he pulled last time I saw him. I warned him if he does it again, you’ll kick him out.”

“That’s not how it works here, Jade. Besides, me and you had a bit of a discussion about what’s going to happen when he comes to visit…” Dave moved his sunglasses down his face a bit, looking her directly in the eyes. “It’s Friday, you’re still single, and this guy here is the most charming dude I know, aside from me, of course. You two hooking up is the inevitable.”

“Oh, so no ‘maybe’ about it. He _does_ think I’m going to swoop in and take you.” The laughter became awkward chuckles, and John looked slightly uncomfortable with the situation he was now in. That look was long gone come the next night, after having gotten to get more comfortable with Jade, and once Dave brought out the drinks it was all but settled that something was going to go down between the two dark-haired people.

The experience was nothing like the ones Jade had gone through with the two guys at the bar; for starters, she wasn’t so drunk that she didn’t remember anything the next morning, and she knew exactly what was happening. All of the details were clear, nothing was left foggy or to the imagination, and when it was over, her and John parted as friends and nothing more: her first real friends-with-benefits situation, and it was actually enjoyable.

She ended up back at her apartment’s front door not long after John decided it was time for him to leave Dave’s house, and after she had said her goodbyes to her best friend and her new bed pal, she was with all her belongings and her dog and was ready to unlock that door and begin her single life. There was one problem with that, however, and that was that the door wasn’t locked, and she was able to come right in. Within seconds of entering her home, strong arms were wrapped around her, the familiar scent of Karkat’s body enveloping her. “Where were you last night?” a worried voice asked her, as fingers were run through her hair. “I thought you knew I was fucking coming home yesterday.”

Where was she the previous night? Getting her world rocked by someone who wasn’t the man hugging her. “Must have slipped my mind, sorry,” she apologized. “I was at Dave’s place.”

“Oh, great, you’ve been with him the whole time, haven’t you? Now you’re going to make me listen to shitty music for ironic reasons, aren’t you?” He pulled away from her, keeping his hands on her shoulders tightly. “Jade, sorry I left like I did. Family matters. You just couldn’t come.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know.” She was blinking many times faster than normal, trying to figure out how she had messed up as bad as she just had. He didn’t leave her, he just had to go do something where she couldn’t—and she had slept with three different guys in the time he was gone, just because she had gotten desperate to find someone to replace him. There wasn’t any harm done though, really, because the one incident she did remember wasn’t done out of love, and she was sure the others weren’t either, and she had enough faith in those guys to know that they had done the right thing.

“You look like you’ve had a rough week. Need to talk about it?” She shook her head and swallowed down hard, hoping that she wasn’t expressing anything that was giving away her current mental state. “Okay, well, if at any point you feel there’s something you need to talk about, you know you’ve got me.”

She nodded. “I sure do know that, Karkat. Thanks.” There was a knot forming in the pit of her stomach, worry building that there would be something she needed to talk to him about.

* * *

The scratching at the door was from Bec, something he did whenever he was concerned with what was happening on the other side. Most of the time it was pointless, but sometimes when he got worried, it was with a good reason: this particular instance was one such time. Jade had locked herself in the bathroom the moment she had woken up, and was curled up on the floor with her arms wrapped around her stomach. This was the third day in a row that this had happened, and after she had ruled out it being due to a bug or to bad food, she was left with one realization that she simply didn’t want to acknowledge.

Karkat too had realized what must have been causing Jade’s problems, but instead of confronting her about it, he decided to leave her alone until she was ready to face the facts. He had no idea what had gone down while he had been out of town, and so he was in a slight state of blissful ignorance, thinking his girlfriend had not only been faithful to him while he was gone, but also that she was giving him the romcom experience of a lifetime and providing him with a child that would have been conceived just days before he left. She definitely hoped that, if she was actually pregnant and it wasn’t some sort of manifestation of her guilt, it was his child, and that she would never have to come clean about the sleeping around that she had done.

There was more scratching at the door, and she sat up, taking a deep breath as she got back to her feet. When she opened the door Bec came bounding in, licking her everywhere he could reach, and she smiled down at him. “Hey there, boy. Glad to see you still love me after what I did.”

Having heard the door open, Karkat came to the entryway and gave her a rare smile. “So what’s the news? Or do you not know yet?” She shrugged, motioning to the unopened box on the sink, and he rolled his eyes. “Listen here, Jade, we can’t start getting excited until you actually fucking take the thing. Otherwise we’ll just be getting our hopes up for nothing.”

“I’m pretty sure I can tell without that stupid thing, actually.” She frowned, but when Karkat frowned back she knew that she had to do it. She pushed Bec out, slammed the door closed, and with her boyfriend impatiently waiting outside, she did what needed to be done to make the test work. Five minutes later and the answer that she had been dreading, the one he had been hoping for, was the one that was revealed. “Oh. Would you look at that. Positive.” She opened the door to show Karkat, but he had heard what she had said and grabbed her so hard the stick flew out of her hand. “Hey, what’s with this celebrating? Aren’t you a bit mad?”

“I’ve spent my whole life watching romantic movies where this is the start of good things. I could never be mad when you’re letting me live my dream.” He wrapped his arms around her and hugged her so tightly he lifted her off the ground. “Thank you for being my woman. I’m going to get to be a fucking father!”

“Heh, yeah you are,” she said, struggling to breathe as he held her. She tried to sound excited, but she knew the reality of the situation, and there was just as much of a chance of those other guys being the father of the clump of cells calling her womb home as there was the chance that he was. In a perfect world, he would unquestionably be the dad, but there was no way to be absolutely sure that he was until the kid was born, unless she wanted to let him know about what she had done. But why would she ruin his happiness like that?”

He put her down after a minute or so of excited hugging, and just like that he went back to his sour-faced expression and didn’t seem happy at all. “Back to reality, I suppose. How the fuck are we going to raise a kid?”

“I don’t know, big proud expectant papa, how are we going to manage that?” She crossed her arms in front of her, her hands resting down in front of her stomach. “I mean, I can’t be more than a month into this, so we’ve got time to figure things out…”

“You know what, I’m sure we’ll find some way to pay for all the shit we’re going to need to get, and I’m pretty damn sure that everything will come together when we need it. Why don’t we not worry now, and just deal with it when it’s time to panic?” He still had an angered expression, but his voice was soft and optimistic. “It’s probably the best thing to do in this situation, anyway.”

“Yeah, sure. Two barely twenty-one-year-old people having a kid of their own, and the best thing to do in the situation is wait until panic time before they do anything. I think I’m a bit scared to see what else those romcoms of yours taught you.” She grinned at him, and was able to get a chuckle to escape his lips. “Did they tell you anything about raising a kid?”

“They tend to skip over that part.”

It was then her turn to laugh. “Means we’re going to be doing a whole lot of learning over the next few months then, doesn’t it?” He said it did, and everything seemed to be just fine, but she was positive that he had no idea that she’d be researching things beyond simple child care. She had to know who the father of the kid inside of her was, before it was too late for her to do anything about it.

On top of the typical research of the week-to-week growth of an unborn child, Jade took part in many searches on how early in a pregnancy, if at all, it was possible to test for who the child’s father was. All of the results she found had differing week ranges, and required there to be blood testing of the potential father, on top of prices that were definitely a bit too much for her to be thinking about. But was it worth the peace of mind? She was worrying about how Karkat would react if the child wasn’t his, and she wanted him to know with complete certainty that it belonged to him, especially since there was the chance that it didn’t.

At the first doctor’s appointment, scheduled right after she had confirmed her pregnancy, she hadn’t been able to bring any of this concern up, due to Karkat being there with her and him still being unaware of anything. All the questions the doctor asked involving the father’s history were answered as if it was Karkat who was the dad, because he was present and he was assumed to be holding that position. But when she went alone for the second appointment a month or so later, due to Karkat being unavailable at the time, she brought up her concerns and worries with the doctor, who was very understanding but did tell her a lot of the same things her research did.

“It all comes down to how important finding out is,” the doctor plainly told her, looking over her clipboard at Jade. “The man you were with last time, he seemed rather excited for this. If you were to go through the testing and found out that it wasn’t him who fathered this child, what would happen? And would you want that to happen?”

“He’d leave me, that’s that. I don’t want him to go, but I don’t want to break his heart by having him be with me the entire time for nothing.” She sighed, trying to look anywhere but at the doctor. “I’ve looked up the dangers of this kind of stuff, and it’s either slightly dangerous to the baby or expensive or both. But I need to know. For Karkat.”

“It is rather pricey, but if you insist on knowing then I’ll give you some information on one of the safest ways to find the paternity of an unborn child.” The doctor stood up, heading for the door. “Just wait here. I’ll return with some papers in a moment.” Jade nodded in response, and the doctor left, leaving her alone in the room with nothing but her fears. While it was nice to have someone so understanding taking care of her, it was also worrying when the doctor wasn’t acting like it was an important situation. She needed someone who cared, someone who got that having one of four possible men as the father of her child was a big deal, especially when that one man may or may not have been the guy she was with.

The doctor came back, handed her a stack of papers and explained to her that choosing to do the testing would require some sort of DNA sample from all the possible fathers, and the rate went up if there were more than three samples that needed to be tested. That news caused the blood to drain from Jade’s face, as it was going to cost an extreme amount to begin with and any added costs would just be too much. She had to narrow her choices down somehow, and she needed to get the samples without Karkat realizing what was going on.

“If you’re going to go through with this,” the doctor said, “you should do it before you’re halfway through the pregnancy. Any time after that and you will be stuck with the child, even if you don’t like the results.” She was referring to abortion. Jade was listening to the doctor tell her about the cutoff for abortions, which she wouldn’t have even thought of on her own. The color came back to her face and manifested itself in her cheeks, red with anger. “Oh, my apologies, I just figured bringing that fact up would—“

“Even if this kid belongs to a guy I’ve met once or twice, I’m keeping it, thank you very much.” She made sure to have the papers in hand and she left the office and headed home, to do more research and try to figure out what course of action she needed to take.

Hanging next to her computer was the grainy first glimpse she had of the child, a small blob in a sea of darkness. It was her inspiration for all the searches and the reason for all of her frustrations, and it hung there as a reminder of what she was doing everything for. Bec sat under her feet, a comfort in such a stressful time, as she scrolled through page after page of facts about pregnancy. “I don’t know what to do…” she said out loud, knowing the only thing that could hear her was her dog. “Do I risk it not being his, and not go through with that testing? I could find the money, but should I?”

Being a dog, all Bec did was give a small bark in response. “I know, I know, this is all my fault, and I’ve got to make the decision. But maybe there’s some way I can find my answer without testing…maybe. I mean, I did sleep with them all at somewhat different times, didn’t I?” Bec’s bark that time was louder, more assertive, and to Jade meant a positive answer. “That’s it! I’ve just got to look at the time period where all this happened and find my answer with that!”

Little did she know that there was a range of time where conception could occur, a small range that all but one of the incidents fell under. But before she was able to find that out, she had to deal with Karkat coming home, being genuinely excited still and going on and on about how he was living the life of a movie from his favorite genre. “It’s crazy, when I was gone, my dad was telling me about how we need to get married and start a family young, just like he did, and now here we are, starting that family,” he said, his elbows resting on Jade’s shoulders as she still sat at her computer. He narrowed his eyes and began to frown as he saw what was on her screen, however. ‘“Hey, why are you looking up how to estimate the date of conception?”

“Oh, I’m just curious about it, that’s all,” she replied, lying through her teeth. “The doctor said it was too early to give a definite date, so I wanted to find one for myself. I could only find ranges, though.”

“Come on, you know when we made that baby. There’s no fucking need to look it up.” He rested his chin on the top of her head, sighing as he did. “You can do things aside from looking up things about kids, you know.”

“Like…?” She closed the tab she had opened with the search, having found only the same range of dates that her doctor had told her before the paternity question had been brought up. “There’s not much on my mind aside from this.”

He chuckled. “Like maybe you can go out and find yourself a damn ring or something. I don’t know. I’m not suggesting that you do that or anything.” She gasped, pushing him off of her so that she could turn her head and look him in the face, her mouth opened in shock and her eyes wide. “What? I said I wasn’t suggesting you do that. It was just an idea I was throwing around, holy fuck.”

“No one just randomly suggests that their girlfriend goes and picks out a ring, dumbass.” She grinned at him, lovingly nudging him with her head. “Not like I’m going to do that alone, but seriously? This isn’t one of your movies.”

“It feels like it is.” He put his arms over his chest as she nudged him again. “Not every guy out there gets the chance I’ve got, and the ones that do are normally romcom characters. Gotta take advantage of the situation while I can.”

She laughed, but felt bad on the inside. It was a messy situation, especially with him being so excited and happy and so unlike himself, and if the kid wasn’t his, she was sure that there would be some serious hell to pay. Ruining what seemed like Karkat’s life dream was never something that she had wanted to do, yet there she was, possibly doing just that.

* * *

“You want me to call John and get him to come back out here? Are you out of your mind? I mean, I love me some Egbert-Strider bonding time, but I can’t stand him in more than small doses.” Dave’s voice was assertive, but still flirting with playful as it normally was. “What’s the big deal, anyway? Ended up getting the hots for him, even after you got your man back?”

“Ugh, no, I do not have the hots for him!” She leaned back against the wall, staring Dave down through his sunglasses. It had been a few weeks since the second doctor’s appointment, and while time was starting to dwindle on her best window for those expensive paternity tests, it was becoming the time where trying to mask the pregnancy was getting harder and harder. If it wasn’t for the fact that Dave was the second person she told about it, she wouldn’t have even bothered coming to see him. But he knew the situation just as well as she did, and as long as he didn’t tell Karkat a word, she trusted him with all the information. “I just need to sit down and talk with him about all this. About the possibility that he’s the father.”

“Jade, I can tell you with about one hundred percent certainty that it’s not him. I had to take the trash out after you two were done, and I can assure you that there was a little rubber surprise in there.” That was how Dave was, blunt but always spreading the news that deserved to be spread. “I think if you need to talk to anyone, it’s those numbskulls from the bar. You know, the guys you never wanted to talk to again?”

She slunk down on the wall a bit, before sliding into a sitting position on the floor. “Yeah, I know who you’re talking about, and I’d rather not talk to them, but I think I’ll have to. I’d just rather it be John over either of them, if it’s not Karkat.”

“Like I said, I know you two fucked safely, so he is definitely out of the picture. You and Karkat…eh, I know he wanted kids because his dad said it was a good idea. And those other two, well, the only ones who know what happened there are you and them, so there’s that.” He walked around the room a few times, thinking as he did, with his finger almost glued to his chin. “I really don’t know what to tell you, Jade.”

“Except to talk to those two.”

“Well, yeah, but you don’t want to do that and I’m going to play the role of supportive best friend here and tell you that you don’t have to talk to a potential baby daddy if you don’t want to.” He shrugged, continuing on with his pacing. “Not like they’d want anything to do with the kid anyway. It’s for the best that you just let it be.”

She knew that he was probably right, but the idea of letting things happen without any intervention didn’t sit right with her. “But what if the kid comes out looking like one of them and not Karkat? What then?”

“I did enough schooling to know genetics are weird. Just blame it on a bad combo of your genes and he’ll lap it up.” Again, Dave shrugged. “Or maybe you could come clean and hope that he’s seen at least one movie with this exact plot that has a happy ending.”

She groaned, putting her face in her hands. “I don’t think he’ll be too pleased if I come clean then. I’ve got to come clean soon, I know I do, but I need to make sure that I’m coming clean for no reason but to clear my conscious. I definitely don’t want him to worry like I am.”

“Karkat? Worry? Oh man, if you don’t want him worrying, you’ve got the wrong guy as your boyfriend slash potential baby daddy. He worries about the monsters in the closet sometimes.” The comment elicited a laugh from Dave, who had stopped pacing and was now towering over Jade. “He’s probably worrying about you right now, about if that nugget of life in your belly is growing right, about if you’re being safe with your eating habits, about all that shit.”

“How do you know so much about fatherly fears?”

He went from laughing and smiling to having a stern look on his face in less than a second. “I’ve watched my fair share of documentaries.”

“Sounds more like I should be looking through your browser history for references, since you sound like you’ve been researching this stuff for me.” She looked up at him, her green eyes shining with enjoyment in knowing that Dave knew a lot more about this stuff than he should have. “I knew I had a best friend I could count on.”

“Don’t think you’re getting me to go to the bar and talk to those guys for you. And definitely don’t think I’m calling John back out here.” He waved a finger in her face before walking away, headed to his bedroom. Rather than following him back there to continue the conversation, she decided to continue sitting against the wall, thinking about her next course of action. Without really intending to, she placed her hands on her stomach, and even though her little amounts of research told her that feeling the child at that point was impossible, she swore she could feel something in there, something great that needed more revealed about it.

“I think I’m going to go talk to those guys,” she whispered, tapping her fingers against the slightly stretched skin that once was toned and perfect. “It’s going to help me answer questions about you, little baby, and maybe tell me who your daddy is. As much as I want Karkat to be the one, I’ve got to play with the possibility that it’s not.”

From back in his room, Dave called out, “Don’t talk to the baby in my house! I don’t want anyone overhearing you and thinking you’re talking to me!”

“How did you know that’s what I was doing?” she yelled back at him, her voice echoing against the empty room. “Do you just know me that well?”

“You tend to talk to anything that can’t reply to you. Since Bec’s not here I just assumed you were talking to the kid.” Even though they were in different rooms, she could still hear his hollow laughter. “Don’t do it though, it’s really kind of creepy.”

“Okay, whatever Dave.” She moved one of her hands off of her stomach and used it to wave in his direction, before getting herself up off the floor. “I’m going to leave now. Thanks for being a great friend today.”

He opened his bedroom door and stuck his head out of it. “No problem, Jade. Come over whenever you need someone to listen to your problems and spew nonsense the internet and live birth TV shows taught him.” A moment later and the wooden door was slammed shut, and she shook her head. Even though she loved him like a brother, she was always so confused as to how they had gotten to be so close in life.

Her relationship with him wasn’t what mattered right then, though. It was her plan of attack, one that talking to a fetus that couldn’t even hear her had implanted in her. She needed to go back to that bar, and she needed to do it soon. Time was not on her side for several reasons, and that optional testing wasn’t even one of them anymore. It was more about how long she had until Karkat found out about what she had done than anything else.

* * *

Finding a night where she could get away from Karkat without him getting suspicious was much harder than she had imagined. He had become extremely protective of her, and if she went anywhere that wasn’t a normal place for her, he had to tag along, for fear of something bad happening and taking his chance at being a dad away from him. It was honestly a bit smothering, and she was scared that it was just get worse as time went on.

That meant she needed to take action quickly, and using Dave as an excuse was the best way she could think of to get out of their apartment without raising any sort of red flags. Dave was, after all, her best friend and Karkat knew that he would never, ever, in a million years do anything to hurt Jade. Once he found out that it was Dave’s idea for her to ever set foot in that bar he would probably change that idea, but for now it was the only foolproof plan. She spent just a few minutes in the small shack, just long enough for Karkat to leave, before she was on her way to the only place she was willing to meet with those two guys ever again.

The floorboards were still rather creaky when she entered the bar, and much to her dismay there didn’t seem to be anyone present aside from the bartender. But once she was actually inside, she heard a voice that she had only heard once before, that being on the morning when she had woken up in Eridan’s bed.

“You’re a disgrace!” it shouted, coming through one of the walls into the main room. “You can’t even eat me out right, can you?” As the ranting and raving continued, out from one of the doors came a familiar face, one Jade would rather have never had to see again, but familiar nonetheless. He noticed her standing near the entrance and gave a small wave, but acted like he had no idea who she was when the other woman came out from the same door. “What, you’re too scared to argue with me about this? Fuck, Tavros, this is why no one likes you!”

“This is why you have two boyfriends, Vriska. Because one of us is good at the real stuff, while the other can only please you as long as he isn’t sticking his—“ The bartender broke a glass at that moment, causing Tavros to shift his attention from chewing the woman out just long enough for her to smack him in the back of the head. “—ow! What’s that for?”

She smacked him again. “For bringing up that other guy when it’s me and you time.”

“It’s easier to remember he exists than pretending he doesn’t.”

“Um, excuse me.” Instead of being an innocent bystander, Jade decided it was time to get involved to get places while on her mission. “Where is the other guy?”

The woman known as Vriska rolled her eyes. “Does it matter? Obviously he’s not my active boyfriend at this moment. You a bill collector or something?”

“No, I’m not, but I’d like to talk to him. And Tavros too, but you’re with him and I don’t want to disturb your time with him.” She said that, thinking that this slightly crazy woman would just tell her where Eridan was and leave it at that, but instead she had the tall and tanned Tavros shoved in her direction. “Uh, I don’t want to disturb you…?”

“Take him. He’s useless when it comes to pleasing me, anyway.” She took a seat at the bar and started up a conversation with the bartender, leaving Jade with the first guy that she had slept with that wasn’t Karkat. It was the first time they had seen each other since the morning after, and with his girlfriend present, it was one of the more awkward situations in Jade’s life.

But she had to push through the awkwardness and get to the point. “Sorry to bother you, but we might have a problem on our hands.”

He sighed and motioned for her to sit at some chairs as far from Vriska as they could get. “Let me guess, your boyfriend got back with you?”

“That’s not a problem.”

“He’s not mad that you slept with me? Because Vriska was mad that I slept with you. And that Eridan slept with you. And that we knew she was sleeping with us both. It was a big mess.” He shrugged. “But it’s okay now, because she’s openly with us both and we’re all happy. I guess.”

“Great for you. Doesn’t help me though.” To drive her point home, she pointed to her stomach, which was pressing up against the fabric of her shirt. “There’s a kid in there, and I don’t know if it’s yours or Eridan’s or my boyfriend’s or this other guy’s. Well, I’m pretty sure it’s not the other guy’s, but that still leaves three of you and I need answers.”

He slowly blinked a few times, before looking between her and Vriska. “I can’t take responsibility if it’s mine, if that’s what you’re here to ask about. I would be killed if I had to watch a kid sometimes. Vriska hates kids and I don’t want to disappoint her.”

“Yeah, well, if it’s yours you’re definitely going to have to take responsibility. I look tan but it’s from the sun, and my boyfriend Karkat is whiter than white. You’re dark. If it’s yours, it’s going to be really obvious.” She bit her lip, hoping he got the message.

By the way he responded, her message had come across loud and clear. However, he had a suggestion for how to deal with it, one she did not want to hear. “Why don’t you just find out who the dad is before it’s born? They can do that, right?”

“They can, but it costs a lot of money and I’m trying not to have to do that! Do you have any ideas of how to clear yourself from the list of potential fathers?” He sat and thought for a few minutes, throwing out a few outdated ideas (she couldn’t help but roll her eyes when he said that he couldn’t be the dad because it was their first time together), and by the time he had exhausted all of his thoughts she was growing worried about the possibility that it was his, because not only would it be obviously not Karkat’s, but it would also make her have to interact with this guy more than she ever wanted to.

“I don’t know what to do, if you keep turning down all of my ideas,” he said, as she buried her face in her hands and mumbled about how screwed she was. “I’m trying to help.”

“I get that you are, and I appreciate it, but listening to you talk is making me want to cry and I can’t believe I ever slept with you. And it makes me hope that this kid isn’t yours, because if it is I _will_ cry.” She uncovered her face and looked at him, as he started to stutter and apologize for whatever he had said that had upset her. “Stop, just…stop. I’m just going to cross my fingers that I never have to get involved with you again. Ever.”

He snapped from being apologetic to angry in a matter of seconds. “Well if that’s how you’re going to be, fine. And if it is mine, don’t bother telling me. Me and Vriska will be better off not knowing.”

“Good, because she’s someone I don’t want anywhere close to my kid!” She hopped off the chair and left the bar after that, not saying anything else to anyone and not bothering to think about what Tavros would be saying to Vriska about the situation. It was just assumed that there would be lying to cover his pansy ass, and that was the end of that.

Getting to meet with Eridan again was much harder, because she couldn’t do it at that bar, since someone she didn’t want to see would be there with him. She also couldn’t do it at his place, because of the chance of Vriska being there and having to deal with that woman was not something Jade ever wanted to do again in her life. She had to resort to asking Dave for a favor, getting him to interact with the man for her just to set up some meeting time and place.

He was, of course, reluctant to do anything of the sort. “I’unno, Jade, seems kind of sketch. Guy’s got a bit of a reputation of hitting on everything he sees, and I don’t think I want to be his newest target. I love you and all, but…”

“Come on, best friends do things for each other, and this is something I really need you to do for me.” If she wasn’t above literal begging, she would have been on her knees in an instant. “I need to talk to him, but I’ve got no other way of doing it.”

“What happened to the Jade who was gung-ho on doing dangerous things? Old you would have jumped at the sound of this adventure, going into the belly of the beast to find some guy you don’t even like, but here you are, being a puss about doing it.” Dave chuckled, poking Jade in the arm. “I thought you’d love to beat that bitch down.”

“I would love to, really, since I know how big of a bitch she really is, but I’ve kind of got other things to worry about.” Like she had done when she was talking to Tavros at the bar, she motioned to her stomach, which had grown slightly more in the week since her bar endeavor. “This whole pregnancy thing has really mellowed out my adventurous spirit.”

“More like, it’s made you into a dependent woman, and I never thought that you’d depend on anyone for anything.” He poked her again and she grabbed his finger, bending it backwards. “Hey, let me go!”

“Say you’ll do it.”

As she bent his finger more, he began to drop his normally stoic demeanor and yelp in pain. “Yes, yes, I’ll do it! I’ll find a way to get you talking to him!” She released his finger and he brought it close to his chest, rubbing it with his other hand. “God damn you can be assertive when you feel like it.”

“I’ve learned from Karkat.” She shrugged. “He’s the best at bossing others around, and I’ve learned a trick or two from him.”

“Remind me to never get on his bad side then. Oh, wait, doing this and having it end badly would do nothing but put me on that bad side.” Dave dropped his hands into his pockets and sighed. “The things a guy will do for his best friend.”

“You’re not scared of Karkat and you know it,” she retorted, sticking her tongue out at him. “Besides, he’s all bark and no bite. Get him mad enough and he’ll just yell.”

“Sounds like something that would go down on the playground, not in the lives of young twenty-somethings who have their entire lives ahead of them. Unless, of course, their name is Jade and they slept around too much.” A smile crept onto his face, but quickly disappeared when a fist was swung at him and connected with his arm. “Hey! I’m just saying!”

“I don’t care if you’re ‘just saying’ anything! I need you to make talking to Eridan possible for me, and that’s it! No more playing around!” She hit him a few more times, no real force to her punches, until he swore that he would do it.

Dave never went back on his swears and promises, and so he had to locate the man he had once referred to as “never-been-laid” and tell him that there was a slight chance that the one verified occasion he had been laid, he could have impregnated the woman he had slept with. Eridan, unexpectedly, took the possibility very seriously and agreed to meet with Jade to discuss it—but only if it happened somewhere where Vriska would definitely not find him.

That was how he ended up sitting next to his possible baby’s mother on the couch in Dave’s home, because it was the safest place Dave could think of for it to go down. “You know, maybe a cafe or something would have been more appropriate for this,” Jade remarked, trying to avoid all eye contact with the guy she shared the couch with. “Because although _he’s_ safe here, Karkat could literally walk in at any time and I’d be screwed.”

“Why worry about him when you’ve got me here, babe?” Eridan’s hand crept onto Jade’s leg, where it was promptly slapped away. “I’m just sayin’, you don’t have to panic if he comes in, because I’m here for you.”

“Uh, no one ever said I was romantically interested in you, and I don’t want to be with you. I just needed to talk to you about your possible paternity to my baby…but since Dave already seems to have handled that for me, I don’t really get why you came here.” She had to slap his hand away from her again, this time from off of her arm. “And stop touching me!”

He let out a small sigh and pulled his hand into his lap. “I just want to be wanted. You seem like a nice lady, and with this all happening, I figured maybe this was my chance to get with someone decent that doesn’t have someone else in her life.”

“Except I have Karkat already!”

“I get it, I get it. He’s who matters, not me. I’m only here because I wanted to talk about the chance of the kid bein’ mine.” He played with his fingers, trying to keep himself from seeming like he cared about the situation. “If it comes out lookin’ like me, please let me know. I want to be there for it. I really do.”

She sighed, annoyed at how he was acting. “Why else would I want to tell you of the possibility? I’m giving you the warning that this might happen, that you might have to be there for it.”

“Which I want to do.” He smiled, looking at her, and she just sighed again. “What’s wrong?”

“Of all the guys I had to sleep with, why did I pick two of the most repulsive people on this planet?” She leaned back in her spot, her head touching the wall behind them. “You’re nice, I’m sure, but you’re kind of clingy. And touchy. And then that Tavros guy was the absolute worst. How did I fuck up this badly?”

The response she was given was a few sniffles followed by loud, fake crying. “I don’t mean to be so bad, I promise!” he cried out, between his fake sobs. “I just want to be wanted by someone who actually cares, and I thought you might care when you don’t!”

“Dude, seriously? The only reason I’m even talking to you now is because I just so happened to get pregnant after not just sleeping with my boyfriend, but with three other guys, and as much as I hope that Karkat’s the dad, I have to face the reality that he just might not be. I don’t care about you. I never wanted to speak to you again after what happened between us. But things happened and now we’re here. So stop your damn crying and act like a man.” She gave a huffy breath, and he stopped sniffling. “I sure hope this kid isn’t yours, because having to put up with your dramatic ass ever again might just kill me.”

Dave walked into the room then, as Eridan was getting up to leave after having been put in his place by Jade. “Aw, you two have a little fight?” he jokingly asked. Eridan responded by getting to the door, opening it, and slamming it shut once he was gone. “Fuck, what was that guy’s problem?”

“I don’t know, he’s insane? He should never actually find someone to be with?”

“I take it that your conversation with yet another potential baby daddy went terribly.” She nodded and he sat down next to her, wrapping one of his arms around her in a protective hug. “It’s okay. Maybe it’s a sign that you shouldn’t ever sleep around again.”

She rolled her eyes but laughed. “I’m pretty sure I’m never going to sleep around again anyway. It was a terrible mistake that you convinced me to make.”

“Hey now, I convinced you of nothing except moving past Karkat—and I only did that because you said you weren’t with him anymore! So really, it’s your faulty memory’s fault that you made that mistake.” He squeezed her a bit closer to her. “But that’s okay, because I know this is all going to end up just fine for everyone.”

“How do you know that? You can’t see the future.”

“You’re right, I’m just trying to make you feel better about all this. But you know what? There are two things super-cool best friends do for each other. One is talk to creepy assholes for the other, and two is be supportive.” Dave flashed a grin at Jade and she giggled. “No matter what happens, if the kid is Karkat’s or someone else’s, you know you’ve always got me here for you. Always.”

She hesitated before speaking, taking a sharp breath before letting all the words spill out: “Thanks so much for being here and being accepting, and being the bestest best friend a girl could ask for.”

“You’re welcome, Jade. Now let’s go do something fun, like drive around and honk at prostitutes. Something to get your mind off of all this.”

“You know what? I think I’m up for your kind of fun right now.” She smiled and nuzzled herself into him, happy that no matter what, she had someone in her life who would accept her.

* * *

The time where the doctor had suggested doing the testing had come and gone, with Jade choosing to go without the tests because she didn’t want to risk finding something out that she didn’t want to know until it was inevitable. Money, she had found out, wasn’t a problem because of Eridan, who had shown up at Dave’s door a few days after their sit-down and offered to leave some cash for Jade in case she needed it. But he had turned it down for her, and after they laughed about the whole thing she realized that she simply had to go through this blind, with nothing more that hope leading them.

That was okay with her in the end, however, because it meant that she wasn’t risking killing her child to find out if she was going to make Karkat leave her or not. He was still completely unaware about there being even a chance of him not being the father, although he had begun to suspect something was amiss when she refused to do much in the way of name planning. “What do you mean, you want to wait? You’re making your fucking child have no name until you know what it looks like?”

“Yeah, I kind of am!” She was, and that would have been the plan all along, but there was another element to it: she didn’t want Karkat getting attached to it with a particular name when there was still a chance that it wasn’t his. “Besides, don’t you want to see our baby before we give it a final name?”

“Not really. I want to be able to tell my dad what to put on the card and all the gifts that he sends.” He looked up at Jade from his computer, where he had been searching through several baby name websites. “Do you know how hard it is to find good names when you don’t even know what the baby is?”

“And here you are, worrying about the name to tell your dad. Just have him send green things and don’t worry about the name.” She stuck her tongue out at him and he frowned, before turning back to his search. “You’re still going to look, aren’t you?”

He nodded. “Have to be prepared.”

“You know a good way to be prepared? Follow what your pregnant girlfriend is telling you, then you’ll be just fine.” She jabbed him in the shoulder with her elbow, which didn’t please him in the slightest. “Also, loosening up would do wonders. You’re so uptight about all this.”

“I’m sorry that I want to have the best for my unborn son or daughter. I mean, it’s already going to have to grow up in a home with unwed parents, so it’s got that going against it, but…”  
She jabbed him again. “We can fix that eventually.”

“Eventually doesn’t excuse the fact that my dad _did_ say get married first,” he said, clicking his tongue and calling Bec over to where they were. The dog curled up next to him, white fur flying everywhere. “We have a dog and a place to live and a baby on the way, why the fuck aren’t we married?”

“Because we’re still young, maybe?” She shrugged, finding somewhere to sit across the room from him. “Because we didn’t think we were going to do this?”

“Yeah, about that.” He closed his computer and looked at her once more. “I had, uh, kind of been hoping that this would happen. So that my dad would let us get married even though we’re young. So that we could follow in his footsteps.”

“Uh huh. Karkat, I don’t believe a word of that.” She rested her hands on the top of her stomach, something she had never imagined that she’d be able to do. And if she hadn’t imagined herself like this, why would Karkat have? “Why else would you be panicking about a name or not being married if you wanted this to happen?”

He frowned more. “Because I didn’t fucking think things through.”

“Congrats, now we’re both screwed.”

“Hey, don’t act like that. I mean, my dad knows and he’s up for helping us out. Dave will definitely help us. And we’re strong people, we know how to manage. It would just help if I knew what the damn kid was so I could get a name for it!”

“I’m not telling you what it is, because I don’t want to hear you freaking out about _that_. We’ll manage, yeah, if you stop worrying so much about naming the kid and focus more on getting prepared for it. We don’t exactly have all the time in the world left for this.” He nodded and she smiled, happy to see that he understood what she was saying. But when their eyes met and a small smile appeared on his face, she had reason to worry. “Uh, Karkat…?”

“I have an idea. It’s fucking crazy, but it’s an idea and we’re going to act on it.”

That was how they ended up inviting several people over for the sole purpose of readying the house for the arrival of the baby. It happened a few weeks after their conversation, when time was even less abundant than it had been, and that was Karkat’s main selling point on getting people to come help. “I can’t believe we’re doing this,” she said, her face in her hands, as Dave sat next to her. “He’s going to drive everyone else crazy with his own breed of crazy!”

“Could be worse. I mean, you could be about to pop with everyone here.” He looked at her over the rim of his sunglasses and laughed. “So be happy that it’s just like this.”

“I’d be happier if you hadn’t brought John along…” Her hands moved from her face to nearly around Dave’s neck as she started getting angry. “Why would you bring him here when you know he likes saying things he shouldn’t in the name of humor?”

He pretended to be choked a bit, gagging as she shook him rapidly. “Because he wanted to congratulate Karkat on actually banging you, I think.”

“ _He_ banged me too, you fucker!”

“Yeah, I’m aware of that. It kind of happened in my house, if you didn’t remember. I found his used schlong casing in the trash the next morning.” He coughed, his fake gagging having irritated his throat. “We’ve gone over that.”

“But it still happened, and Karkat doesn’t know about that. Or about those other guys too.”

“I don’t know about what?” Standing right next to her, arms over his chest with a stern look on his face, Karkat was anything but happy. “You sleeping around and being a little whore? Why haven’t I heard about this until now, huh?”

She gasped. “You heard about it?”

“John, being the funny guy he thinks he is, told me about the time you slept with him. And now there’s other guys involved too? What, next you’re going to say the kid’s not mine too, aren’t you?”

“There was a chance about that bu—“

“I don’t want to hear it!” He threw his arms into the air, visibly angry now. “You fucking slept with other guys while I was gone, then didn’t tell me even though it was really fucking important that I knew! You’re such a fucking bitch!”

Her head fell in shame, as she let go of Dave and tried to keep herself from crying. “I didn’t want to hurt you…”

“If I wasn’t so committed to you, I’d leave right now!” She could hear him taking big, angry breaths and she was prepared for him to attack her more. What came next was something she had never expected: “It’s probably for the best that I’ve known about this since it happened, huh?”

“You…what?”

“Yeah,” Dave chimed in, “ you what?”

From around the corner, blue and green paint splattered all over himself, John made his grand appearance into the conversation. “Did you really think I wasn’t going to talk to Karkat about what I was told when I got told it? I get an invite to Dave’s place, get told that Jade’s single and needing a bed buddy, and I have to fact check.” He smiled that smile that no braces could fix, and grabbed Karkat into a headlock, ruffling up his hair. “So I told him what I was told and he did what he needed to do with that information.”

“So what did you do with that?” Jade asked, her voice small and worried that maybe Karkat had done something as bad as she had.

“I slept with some girls out there. Real nice ladies.” He squirmed, trying to get away from John, to no avail. “Figured I’d tell you whenever you got around to telling me about you sleeping with other guys.”

“You’re kidding me.” She rubbed at her eyes, trying to eradicate all evidence of her having been in tears moments before. “You have to be. You slept with girls who aren’t me?”

He gave a grunt in approval. “Sure did.”

“So you knew why I was being so secretive about things, huh?”

“You made it really obvious. Also your little notes to yourself next to your computer didn’t help things very much.” Once he broke himself away from John’s headlock, he put his normal grumpy face on, but not until after winking at Jade with a tiny smile. “I think you’ll find that you have nothing to worry about with any of those notes, by the way.”

“W-what do you mean?” She looked to Dave, who shrugged, then to John, who was walking back to the baby’s room, and finally to Karkat, who she locked eyes with. His dark eyes, normally so mysterious and brooding, were shining and happy. “You’re not going to tell me, are you?”

“Eh, you didn’t tell me you thought that some creepy guys from a bar could be your baby’s dad, so I won’t tell you what I know.” She pouted but he didn’t budge on his stance, only making one more comment before he left to return to room preparing. “I know you said to not have the name ready until it’s time, but I know what name we’re going to use and I don’t fucking care if you hate it, because you hid some serious shit from me and this is your retribution for that.”

With that he was gone, leaving her stunned but excited about the fact that she wasn’t hiding any secrets anymore. Although, as Dave pointed out moments later, she hadn’t exactly been hiding anything from anyone but herself the entire time. “You know what, it’s probably a good thing that that’s how it’s been, because if this was the first Karkat had actually heard about any of it…I would be killed on the spot.”

“Does it make you mad that he slept with other girls to get payback?”

“As long as he didn’t make any kids with them, I don’t really see a problem with it. I wasn’t faithful, so why should he have been? It all worked out.” Except it hadn’t all completely worked out, not at that point. There wasn’t complete, definitive proof that the baby was Karkat’s, and until she knew that for certain she couldn’t actually claim that it had all worked out.

* * *

In the grand plan of the world, there must have been some reason for things having happened the way they did, but it wasn’t Jade’s place to know that. She was just supposed to know that, after all the stress and worrying she had done throughout the pregnancy, dealing with the reality that the father of the baby could be someone that wasn’t her boyfriend, everything turned out pretty okay for everyone that mattered.

This realization was made, of course, after hours of suffering and screaming at Karkat about putting her through this pain and him simply screaming back at her that he didn’t mean to hurt her. It didn’t matter at that point who the real father was, because the one that was going to be there was Karkat and there was nothing that would change that. They had resolved the only problem there had been, and he was going to be there for her, no matter what. Even if the child was dark like Tavros, or angular like Eridan, or had somehow managed to be John’s, it didn’t matter. Karkat was going to be the father, and that was that.

So when the baby, a perfect little girl with ten little fingers and ten little toes, made her way into the world, it wasn’t so much of a relief as it was a reassurance when she looked just like a mini female version of Karkat, aside from the lips perfect for smiling and the wide eyes just like her mom’s. All the worrying Jade had done was for nothing, and when she got to hold her baby for the first time she cried so much that she made Karkat start crying too.

“S-she’s so perfect…” she managed to say, as she watched the little girl’s eyes flicker open and closed at the sounds around her. “It’s amazing it w-worked out like this…”

He nodded in agreement, kissing her on the cheek before saying anything. “You know it would have worked out like this anyway, though.”

“It could have been different.”

“Could have, sure, but do you want to think about that? You just pushed my child out of you, do you really want to start wondering what if it had been someone else’s damn kid?” She laughed even with her tears and he smiled. “Glad you get my point, Jade.”

She abruptly stopped laughing when the baby began to whine, and instead turned all focus to calming the child down. It was an easy task with such a small baby and soon she was calm and sleeping. “I get all your points, Karkat,” she said as the baby had begun drifting to sleep, “and I’m glad you make them. But I do have two questions for you.”

“Two?” He looked as if he was taken aback by her statement. “Go on.”

“Well, first and most importantly, what are we going to name her, mister ‘I have a name picked out’?” She turned to look at him with pure curiosity on her face. “You haven’t told me.”

“I don’t want to answer that yet. What’s the other question?”

She rolled her eyes, before yawning. Childbirth had taken a lot out of her, and as much as she wanted to argue with him until she got the information she had requested, she was too tired for it. “What did you know that you didn’t want to tell me?”

“Oh, yes, the fucking golden question I’ve been waiting to answer forever.” The smirk on his face told Jade that she had opened a can of worms that she might not have wanted to. “All the little pictures of the unborn baby were with those notes, and I happened to find out not only what gender she was—without you telling me, since I didn’t want to know but I knew anyway—but that there was no way she could have been anyone else’s.”

“She could have been.”

“Yeah, if your body had royally fucked you over. Which it didn’t. All that information you had been given pointed only to me, but you were so worried about it not being me that you saw things that just weren’t there.” She frowned, because he was making her feel stupid and she hated it, especially after what she had literally just been through not long before this. “Sorry, but by the time you went out sleeping around, she was already beginning to develop.”

Jade’s frown got deeper. “But how do you know this? All you were looking up is names.”

“Your best friend is a treasure trove of useless information sometimes.”

As if he had known he was being talked about, Dave walked into the room right then, carrying a bouquet of balloons that were pink and congratulating the birth of the baby. “I missed the woman bits being shown, right?” he jokingly asked, setting the balloons down near the corner of the room and approaching the bed. “What was it like? Glorious?”

“You’re the one who watches the documentaries, you can say you know what it looks like better than I can,” Karkat replied, nudging Dave in the ribs. “But look at what we made.”

He actually took his sunglasses off of his face to get the best possible look at the sleeping child in Jade’s arms. “Yep, looks just like one Karkat Vantas. I told you that you were the dad, didn’t I? Look who was right once again. That’s right, me.”

“You know, Dave, you could have told me that he was going to be the dad and it would have saved me a lot of trouble.”

“Except you needed to learn a lesson? Karkat and I had decided that making you go through all that was a good way to learn, and now that it’s all over, wouldn’t you say that it was?” When Jade sighed and said that it indeed was, Dave’s tight-lipped stoic face broke out into a smile. “See, I knew what to do. And it worked.”

“You’re an asshole though, Dave.” Jade couldn’t help but laugh at her best friend’s excitement at being right. “Thanks for being there through all of this, for both of us.”

He pounded his fist against his chest a few times. “No problem, best friend.”

“Now I think I’m up for answering that other question,” Karkat said, after clearing his throat to put an end to the friend love that was going on. “So when I said I slept with some girls when I was with my dad, that was a lie.”

Both Jade and Dave had the same reaction: a flat what. “You’re joking, right?” she eventually choked out, worried that he was going to say something that would make her regret sleeping with three other guys once more.

“No, I’m not joking. I slept with one girl. Singular, not plural.”

She sighed in relief. “Thank you for still being unfaithful.”

“Welcome. But it’s not like I didn’t know this girl already or something. She’s an old family friend. Real pretty girl. But it was an awkward experience and I regretted it right away, but I knew I did it to not be allowed to make you feel like an ass.” He crouched down to get close to the baby. “She told me that, since I felt bad about making her sleep with me, I should do something to make it up to her.”

“…Karkat, don’t finish that thought. You can’t.” Jade’s mind, even in its tired state, had figured out where he was going and wanted him to go anywhere but there. “We are not naming our baby after your fuckbuddy.”

“It’s not after her! Let me finish the damn story, will you?” He sounded a bit exasperated, and Jade decided that it was best to let him continue. “Okay, so once I found out it was a girl, which was no real thanks to you, Jade, I decided to call my friend up and ask her what to do. She suggested some really weird-ass things, like water birth and a fish-themed lifestyle, but when I told her I needed help with a name, she said to pick a name from something I like.”

Dave snorted. “Probably for the best that you can’t name a girl after Will Smith, huh?”

“Shut up! So I went through all these things that I like, and I just couldn’t pick a name from any of them. They didn’t fucking fit. Then she suggested going through things that you like, Jade. And that was when inspiration hit.”

“Please tell me you didn’t go through my FurAffinity account.” Jade blushed as she even mentioned that vile place, and now that she was a mom she really needed to get rid of that account. When he shook his head, she was relieved. “Okay, great. There’s some questionable stuff on there.”

“Why would I even bother going on there? I know something that you like that had a name I hadn’t even thought about until my friend suggested it.” He clasped his hands together, as if he was preparing for a big reveal. “If it wasn’t for the fact that it’s a terrible name, we’d be naming our little girl something really lame right now.”

He was just stalling for time, and Jade knew it. “Not even going to say what that name is?”

“No.”

“Then continue, because if you have a name for her I’d like to know it.” She was beginning to doubt the existence of any sort of name, which he was picking up on.

“So I told my friend this name and she laughed, because it’s that bad, but once she was done laughing in my fucking ear she had the best idea ever. I guess it’s really obvious that I wanted this kid, because she made sure that this name meant something decent before she suggested it, and I just fell in love with it.” He took a deep breath, and spoke rapidly to finish off his story. “So basically we’re going to name our baby something really kickass like her mommy. We’re going to name her Aimee.”

“Like, short for Amelia?” Jade looked at the little girl, who was still sleeping and looked absolutely peaceful. “I don’t think that’ll work. When I think of an Amelia, I think of Amy Pond.”

Karkat gave a small growl at the sound of the character name Jade had thrown out. “No! We are definitely, one-hundred percent _not_ naming our daughter after that terribly-written woman! We are naming her stand-alone Aimee, spelled with an i and double e!”

“Okay, whatever, weird spelling or not, it still makes me think of her.”

“It’s not supposed to!”

“I don’t know, bro, it makes me think of her too,” Dave said. “You might need to rethink this one.”

If it wasn't for the fact that he was trying to be civil, Karkat would have slammed Dave to the floor at that point. “Her name is Aimee and that’s that. I promised my friend I’d do it. Besides, if you think of that shitty character whenever you use her name, that’s not my problem. My baby’s going to be a strong, independent woman.”

“So is promising her to use this name how you’re making sleeping with her up to her?” Jade nuzzled the newly-named (it wasn't a perfect name by any means, but it was something that obviously had meaning) Aimee closer to her chest. “Or is there more to it.”

He paused for a split second before answering, contemplating all possible reactions to what he was about to say. “It may or may not also have half of her first name in it. No big deal, right?”

After everything, it wasn't really that big of a deal at all.

 

**Author's Note:**

> I started this fic in August, planning for it to be really short and fluffy. Then I abandoned it for months and just recently got inspired to work on it once more, but by then the idea had evolved into something drastically different. And now it's finished, an adventure of a piece reminiscent of the long fic I wrote a year ago (which I make a very veiled reference to at the end--Karkat totally slept with Meenah, yo), and I'm proud as hell of it.  
> The title comes from the Alanis Morissette song "Forgiven", because I am too lame to come up with quirky titles on my own.


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